Pinkalicious Cupcakes!

We've been reading Pinkalicious a lot lately so yesterday we decided to bake pink cupcakes! I found a great vanilla cupcake recipe and added a bunch of pink food gel. We made a couple of changes to our cupcakes though - We frosted ours with green frosting and Bailey also pointed out we forgot to add a cherry on top like Pinkalicious' mom did. I'd like to say we frosted our cupcakes green to counteract the pink food dye like in the story, but they got frosted green because that is Gregory's favorite color.

Vanilla Cupcakes

Here's another great egg and dairy free cupcake from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. They are very moist and not at all crumbly like most vanilla vegan cakes I've tried.

1 c soy milk

1 t apple cider vinegar (i used rice vinegar)

1 1/4 c flour

2 T cornstarch

3/4 t baking powder

1/2 t baking soda

1/4 t salt

1/3 c canola oil (i used light olive oil)

3/4 c sugar

2 t vanilla extract

1/4 t almond extract, caramel extract or more vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line muffin pan with cupcake liners

Whisk the soy milk and vinegar in a measuring cup and set aside a few minutes to get good and curdled

Beat together the soy milk mixture, oil, sugar, vanilla and other extracts, if using, in a large bowl. Sift in the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and mix until no large lumps remain. Add a bunch of pink dye if you like the nice pretty color!

Fill cupcake liners two-thirds of the way and bake for 20-22 minutes til done. Cool completely before frosting.

Wheel Day!

Today was Wheel Day at Bailey's preschool! They had a fire truck (old and new one), police motorcycle, some very old classic cars, an excavator (that did tricks), cement truck, RV, horse carrier, and a school bus for the kids to climb and explore.

Bailey and Gregory on the old firetruck

Here they are waiting for the bus ride around the parking lot

On Thursday Bailey came home covered in paint (I mean covered! Her face and arms and her clothes too) This is what she was working on. The Meadowlark train!

Here they are having some apple juice

Playing on the playground

Sweet Smelling Play Dough - Critter Update

Today was HOT. I think it was suppose to be around 96 today - It's 7:22pm now and it's still 84 degrees out. Tomorrow should be cooler...

Since it was so hot out we planned an indoor activity after Gregory woke up from his nap. In this month's issue of High Five, they had a recipe for Sweet Smelling Play Dough. While Bailey was at preschool, Gregory and I went to pick up some unsweetened Kool Aid so we'd be prepared to make the dough when he got up.

I'll post the recipe, but I have to say, if you make it you need a nice strong wooden spoon and a lot of muscles. The kids had a great time with it and it kept them busy for an hour or more!

Sweet Smelling Play Dough

2 cups water
2 T vegetable oil
One unsweetened package drink mix
2 cups flour
4 T cream of tartar

Mix water, oil and drink mix together. Add to flour and cream of tartar. Cook over medium heat until mixture resembles mashed potatoes (takes longer than you think!). Remove from pan and let cool. Knead dough a bit (we had to add a little more flour) and have a great time!
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CRITTER UPDATE -

This little guy was right by our door the other day. We think he died behind the bbq. He was a mean little guy. Bit the squirrel that hangs out in our yard! Clark put d-con all over the yard. We haven't seen any rats in the last few days so we're hoping they are GONE! (Clark did have to scoop two dead ones this weekend though - He said one had a tail over a foot long!)













Here's the mommy dove with one of her babies. The eggs hatched on Easter Sunday! (She's been sitting on a dead one) They flew the coop Sunday. We had a great time keeping an eye on them! Can't wait until next spring when they'll do it all over again!

Jello Popcorn Balls

I was doing a little search for popcorn snacks and came across jello popcorn balls! I used to eat these when I was young(er) and thought the kids would enjoy. The recipe seemed easy enough so we gave it a try today. Well, it is as yummy as I remember, but boy are they messy to make!

Jello Popcorn Balls

9 cups popcorn
1 cup karo syrup
3/4 cup sugar
3 oz jello (any flavor)

Boil karo syrup and sugar for a few minutes. Add jello and let mixture cool a bit. Pour over popcorn and mix well. Coat hands with butter/margarine and shape into balls, if desired.

Notes: We didn't really get them into balls. I poured it all onto a piece of waxed paper and let it cool. Then broke them into chunks. It was just too sticky to form into balls! Even with coated hands. There must be something I'm missing. I'll have to do more research. :)

Happy Easter!

We had a quiet Easter this year. We (the kids and I) have been sick. Bailey got sick on Wednesday, Gregory on Thursday and Mommy on Friday. The kids are much better now ~ me? Not so good. So far Daddy is doing okay. Let's hope it stays that way.

Well, we missed Easter dinner at Aunty Kristin's house last night ~ along with the Easter festivities. (Good thing we dyed eggs at Grandma and Grandpa's house last week!) We tried our best to toss an egg hunt together for the kids this morning. And the Easter bunny did make a visit, so I think they had a fun Easter morning. Daddy will toss something on the bbq for dinner tonight and Easter will be over.

I posted an Easter scrapbook below. Enjoy and Happy Easter!

Easter Scrapbook

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Happy Birthday, Grandma!

We spent the day today in Stockton to celebrate Grandma's birthday. We arrived around lunch time and after eating the kids took a dip into the pool. It was a quick dip since the water was pretty chilly. After jumping out of the pool they all had to run upstairs to sit in the warm tub for a while. After swimming we dyed eggs and even did a little tie dye work on some paper towels. I want to try that again. I may go buy some dye just to tie dye. I wonder if it'll take to t-shirts? Actually, I'll find out after I try washing Gregory's shirt! Dinner was yummy and we ended our day with cake. Another fun day in Stockton.

See slide show for photos! :) enjoy...

Slideshow

Make a Smilebox slideshow

RATS!

Not darn, but RATS! We counted EIGHT in our yard tonight. They were eating the scrappy bird food that has fallen from our bird feeder. May have to rethink this bird feeder business if we don't get rid of the rats.

Here are four of the cuties. They are babies or at least young'uns.

Here's Daddy trying to whack them on the head! He had to do this three times cuz they kept coming back. Who knows, they still may be out there, but we had to come up for tubbers. The just better not come in the HOUSE!!!

California Academy of Sciences

We enjoyed a nice day at the California Academy of Sciences today.

We packed a picnic lunch this morning and off we went to spend the day in San Francisco - well, a few hours at least. When we arrived, the parking area for the academy was full. So, we had to park in the museum parking lot. I was thinking it was going to be just packed, but we did okay. We got in line for the rain forest as soon as we arrived and waited for maybe 20 minutes; that wasn't too bad.

Bailey said her favorite part of the day was having a picnic and Gregory said his favorite was the tiger. (no tigers today - that was from Wednesday!) Guess we could've stayed at home and had a picnic and called it a day....No, I think they had a good day at the academy.

Kids looking at a red frog

This blue bird was trying to get this string off the branch

Looking at the butterflies

Bailey looking at the butterflies

Gregory chasing bugs on the ground.
You're suppose to try to lure them to a
trap, but all the kids were just stomping
on them and watching them run away

Gregory eating his musubi

Touching the sea star

Gregory showing me he's using his two
fingers to touch the sea stars

Day at the Zoo

After Bailey finished therapy today, we took the kids to the Oakland Zoo.

We picked up a little lunch from Burger King and off we went. The weather was just perfect today in Oakland - it's a little windy in San Ramon, but in Oakland it was really nice. We ate, saw some animals, rode the merry-go-round and the train and then came home.

The perfect afternoon!